Jay McKenna and the Winnacunnet High School boys basketball team will try to get back to its winning ways on Friday when it hosts Bedford in a Division I contest.

Winnacunnet started the season at 4-0, but has dropped its last two games — a 61-59 loss at Pinkerton last Friday, and a 48-43 home loss to Spaulding on Tuesday.

“There are definitely some things we need to fix,” McKenna said after Wednesday’s practice. “The reasons we have come up short is not because we are overmatched, and it’s not like teams have better athletes than we do; we just haven’t executed and that’s a very fixable problem. I am not concerned. Obviously, I am not happy with the results the last two games but there are fixable problems and it’s a long season ... I know we’ll be a lot better.”

The biggest difference between Spaulding on Tuesday and the Spaulding team that lost to Winnacunnet in the Oyster River Holiday Basketball Classic championship game was that senior captain Cal Connelly was in the lineup.

Connelly scored 19 points on Tuesday as Spaulding won its third straight game and improved to 5-1 overall.

“He’s a senior leader and they look up to him,” McKenna said. “He wears that title proudly. He’s very vocal out there, and everything really runs through him. The 19 points is what stands out but when you are there and see him, and I’ve seen him play 100 times over the years in competing against him and watching him play, he brings that leadership mentality to the game, his teammates have a lot of trust in him and he knows that. He handles those responsibilities tremendously well."

Positive signs

McKenna thought senior Freddy Schaake played “another outstanding game,” and also liked the play of senior Seth Provencher, who came off the bench and scored seven points.

“(Provencher) played some very good minutes for us,” McKenna said. “He had a couple of decent stretches and it’s where we are having conversations about how he needs to play more because he’s become a pretty consistent guy on the block for us. He did a great job defensivley, and was great on the offensive end, caught some tough passes in traffic that he was able to convert on and score. I was pleased how he played.”

Getting help?

Sophomore Jack Schaake is no longer in a walking boot and may be back sooner than expected.

“He’s doing his PT and in the training room every day,” McKenna said. “He’s going to get another evaluation soon and maybe the time frame will be shorter than originally thought. We are looking at hopefully two weeks.”

Schaake has not played since the season-opening win over Dover. The sophomore broke a bone in his foot at practice on Monday, Dec. 19.

State of Division I

Portsmouth, at 5-0, is the lone remaining undefeated team in Division I, averaging 77 points a game and outscoring its opponents by an average of 23.6 points a game.

There is a host of one-loss teams, including Spaulding (5-1), Bedford (4-1), Merrimack (4-1), Exeter (4-1) and Alvirne (3-1).

Conversely, Trinity (0-5) and Nashua North (0-4) are still searching for their first wins of the season.

Up next

Bedford arrives to Hampton on Friday for a 6:30 p.m. scheduled tip.

Bedford has won three straight games, including allowing just 13 points in a home win against Merrimack.

“Bedford is another very good team,” McKenna said. “The one word that comes to mind is balanced. They don’t have one kid who is tremendous, but they have a bunch of kids who can play. Defensively, they do a nice job; we’ll have our work cut out of for us.”

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